


burns at both ends

by silkskin



Category: A Crown of Candy - Fandom, Dimension 20 (Web Series)
Genre: Campaign 05: A Crown of Candy, Canon Compliant, Character Study, Dramatic Irony, Drinking & Talking, Friendship, Gen, Late Night Conversations, Past Caramelinda Rocks/Lazuli Rocks, Relationship Study, except there's implied calmethar because i have no self-restraint, wlw mlm solidarity until it isn't
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 20:27:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,770
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25651327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/silkskin/pseuds/silkskin
Summary: “Forgive me, your majesty, if this is not the time, but—you are doing good. Anyone else would be crumbling under the stress.”Caramelinda gives Calroy a dry smile. “I’m flattered you think that I am not.”“I think,” he says, “that Candia would have fallen years ago without you, war or not.”She lets out a huff. “Don’t give yourself too little credit.”Calroy’s grin is sharp. “Trust me, Caramelinda, I am not.”
Relationships: Caramelinda Rocks & Calroy Cruller
Comments: 17
Kudos: 46





	burns at both ends

**Author's Note:**

> the way this is my first acoc fic and it’s not even good bc i banged it out in two days despite having a lapin fic i’ve been working on for over two months. you ever think about how caramelinda calls calroy ‘cal’ even though she’s a billion times more formal than amethar? calrot (calroy brainrot) is real and i simply think amethar wasn’t the only friend calroy betrayed that night
> 
> i shouldn’t need to clarify this but this is not romantic/shippy in any way. if anyone's having an affair with calroy it's amethar :sob:
> 
> title from the poem by edna st villicent millay:  
> “my candle burns at both ends;  
> it will not last the night;  
> but oh my foes and oh my friends,  
> it gives a lovely light.”

The candlelight is dwindling low.

Seven years into her rule, Queen Caramelinda Rocks sighs, rubs her eyes, and dips her quill in her molasses inkwell again. The moonlight falls sweetly through the windows of her study; she has more than a few letters to go through before she can even contemplate sleep. Her back aches, and her hands are sore, and her crown rests on her desk instead of her brow. There is a weight that sits on her shoulders, lonely and burning, that she does not think will ever leave her. No, Caramelinda has long since been disillusioned with the glory of rulership, especially when one must do it alone.

A knock sounds lightly at the door.

Instinctively, Caramelinda straightens her back, but lets some of the tension out of her shoulders when she recognises Lord Cruller’s figure under the light.

“Calroy,” she says, “What’s happened?”

Calroy raises his eyebrow at her assumption. “Nothing, your majesty. I merely saw candlelight under your door so late and thought I might lend a hand.”

Caramelinda sighs as he approaches, shifting her letters back into vaguely organised piles and gesturing. “Your King’s angered some more lords,” she says, wincing a little at her harsh tone but far too tired to stop. “I’ve been trying to broker peace.”

Calroy leans over her desk to read. “Ah, the meeting about trade in the Sour Patches. I remember.”

“It’s not unsalvageable, but I wouldn’t have had to do this had Amethar not—“ She cuts herself off, letting out a frustrated noise. Even at this late hour, she does not want to complain in front of someone else.

But Calroy raises his eyebrow and continues, “If he’d been more delicate with the proceedings given our tenuous alliance with Lord Citris? I agree.”

He pulls up a chair and takes a sugar quill from her desk. “Allow me.”

Caramelinda goes to protest, but Cal gives her a look. “Believe me, your majesty, I love Amethar dearly, but I have never been blind to his faults.” He smiles. “It’s what I’m here for.”

Caramelinda doesn’t disguise her sigh of relief. “Thank you, Cal.” She pauses, a little awkward at the informality, but his smile only softens.

“It’s no problem, Caramelinda.”

She huffs, smiles back at him wearily. “Amethar has made a lot of bad decisions in his life, but I do believe his choice in friends is not one of them.”

Cal lets out a quiet laugh. “I’m honoured.”

After that night, Calroy drops by Caramelinda’s study more often than not, and begins sending messages in forewarning about any time spent with Amethar that meant diplomatic hurdles or issues to solve. Over the years, somewhat of an accord begins to form itself around them, perhaps, amusingly, around Amethar’s blunders, but she likes to think more around their combined love for Candia. The kingdom will forever be recovering from the war, forever be recovering from the loss. That at least, is something that all three of them, Amethar included, feel keenly.

Caramelinda goes to Calroy for statecraft more often than Amethar these days, working their schedules around each other and through important meetings to attend, knowing always to ensure he accompanies Amethar to political parties or feasts. In the evenings, Cal brings warm tea and tales of court scandals, and, more than the messages or the assistance, Caramelinda is grateful for that. The companionship. The reminder that ruling a kingdom cannot be done alone, and won’t be.

On particularly late nights, he’ll even bring wine—the good kind from Fructera. As talking leads to gossipping to laughter, Caramelinda finds herself shedding even more of her court veneer. And, well. If it was a good distraction from nights spent in bed missing Lazuli’s warmth beside her, she’d take it.

Tonight, she’s beginning to feel the alcohol, the buzz at the edge of her senses. Improper, she knows, and this is usually when she’d stop, but something about the cool night air and the warm firelight has her lowering her walls a little more than usual.

Calroy nods to her empty glass. “Another?”

Caramelinda holds out her glass for him to fill, smiling. “How do you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Read my mind. Know what people want so easily.”

“Everyone always wants more wine,” Cal teases, before sobering and taking in the question. “Practice, I suppose. You spend enough time around family, like I have with you and Amethar, and you know them. But you spend enough time in politics, and you know _people_. Know how to predict what they do, how they act. How they tick.” Calroy gestures at her. “You know that better than me, I’m sure.”

Caramelinda nods, taking a sip. The wine sweetens pleasantly on her tongue. “Politics, sure. Family… I don’t know.”

The girls are twelve now, and Caramelinda doesn’t know how to prepare them for anything outside the castle walls. Doesn’t know how to explain that dragging them away from their fun and putting books and tutors in front of them is the best she can do. Doesn’t know how to staunch the resentment building in them like a storm about to break.

Cal looks at her, but not with the pity she usually gets. “I don’t envy you. Being a mother, well. It’s hard enough when you’re not a queen.”

Caramelinda smiles. “Speaking from experience?”

Cal laughs. “Let’s just say, I didn’t have a great relationship with my own. Eight identical siblings, well. She had a lot on her hands.”

“No father?” Caramelinda probes, even knowing Calroy rarely ever talks about his past.

“No,” Calroy says, and then, changing the subject, “Definitely none as good as Amethar.”

Caramelinda sighs, swirling her glass in contemplation for a moment. “Does it sound bad that I wish he were less good of a father?”

Calroy doesn’t reply, but makes a silent gesture for her to continue.

“He just—he spoils the girls rotten, lets them get away with anything. And I’m forced to be...” She trails off.

“You’re not a bad mother, Caramelinda,” Cal says, gently.

She rubs at her temples. “I hate yelling at them, Cal, I really do. I’m just so scared. I can’t lose them.”

“I think,” Cal starts, after a moment, “that family is one of Amethar’s greatest strengths and biggest weaknesses. He looks at the girls and sees his sisters, and he doesn’t have the strength to say no to them. Not like you do.

“I love Amethar, but—he is a good person, and a good father, and those are so rarely what is needed in a good king. He and Candia are lucky to have you.”

Caramelinda sighs, watching the light reflect on the purple wine in her glass. “I _tried_ to love him, I think. But I can’t. Not after Lazuli, and not like this. Not like you do.”

At the mention of Lazuli, Cal turns to look at the portrait of the Archmage, the one Caramelinda keeps hung on the far wall. Caramelinda does not need to turn to remember how she would be looking back—eyes soft and unclouded and lit with the joy of discovery—she knows this particular painting well. Lazuli had been looking at her.

“Did you know,” Calroy says, after a moment, “that Lazuli would write letters to me on the frontline?”

Caramelinda chuckles. “I did. Disguised with Amethar’s?”

“Yes. She knew I read them for him, even during the war. She’d leave a little postscript for me at the bottom about whatever she’d foreseen me doing that day. And, forgive me for saying this, but it was insufferable.”

Caramelinda laughs, a little teary. “I think if anyone knew how to read minds, it was her. She knew you well.”

“Not as much as she wished she did,” he says, shaking his head, “if she felt the need to remind me to do things I was already planning to do.”

Caramelinda grins. “Sometimes, I used to change up my routine, just to see what she’d have to say about it.”

Cal snorts. “What timelines would vanish or appear if I moved my glass a little to the left.”

“If I wore blue instead of pink.”

“Bulb above—did she ever do that?” Cal asks, chuckling, “Tell you to perhaps wear green that day because she’d foreseen someone stab you while wearing pink?”

Caramelinda laughs. “I wish treason could be so easily avoided. Timelines were as difficult as they were useful, most days. She could get caught up in them so easily.”

Cal tilts his head at her, smiling. “I’m glad she had the perfect person to keep her grounded, then.”

Caramelinda beams back, grateful. She thinks missing Lazuli is not so bad when she does it with other people.

Cal leans forward to fill their glasses one more time before the bottle empties. “I meant it,” he says, “When I said Amethar is lucky to have you. I’ll talk to him.”

She smiles. “Thank you, Cal.”

“For what?” Cal smirks. “For dealing with Amethar?”

“For being here.”

He smiles, gentle. “It’s my pleasure, your majesty.” Raises his glass. “A toast?”

Caramelinda brings hers up in return. “To Lazuli.”

The glasses clink together, ringing softly against her study walls. “To Lazuli.”

Six years later, and war breaks upon Candia with all the forewarning of a bolt of lightning.

Caramelinda is alone when the news falls into her shaking hands, when she is once again faced with a darkness on the horizon she barely survived twenty years ago. When she loses everything she has in one fell strike.

What’s left of her family is missing, she is no longer Queen, and Candia is once again at war. Everything she has worked for, gone in an instant, and Caramelinda feels as if the thunder is still to come. She trembles with an anger and a fear and a weariness that she cannot begin to fathom, and she does not fall. She sets her shoulders back, she looks at the soldiers and nobles gathered around her, and she does not falter.

If Amethar has torn apart everything his family died for, she will build it back up again, brick by brick.

The indignity is the worst part, she thinks. Most everyone who respects her still calls her Queen, but sometimes Caramelinda walks down the hall to face down pity and derision from noblemen who would not have dared to stand up to her just a day ago. She’s now no better than them, reduced to just another Candian noblewoman, mistress of the King. There’s an anger roiling in her that she thinks could rival Amethar’s battle rage.

The fear, in the end, comes more often than the anger. No news is good news, Caramelinda tells herself, with every day that passes without word of her daughters. And above that fear, that endless weariness that never seems to leave.

Queen Caramelinda Rocks, Heart of the Realm, holds herself together by the seams, and she can only hope Candia can do the same.

When Lord Cruller returns from Comida, Morris Brie and Manta Ray Jack in tow, Caramelinda feels a surge of relief. She all but runs to the castle entrance, hoping against hope for news about her family, but also with the simple gladness that she had not lost everyone.

When Calroy sees her approaching, he waves off the worried servants and guards and turns to her almost immediately, knowingly. “I’m so sorry, your majesty. I have no news of your daughters, or of—“ his voice cracks, “King Amethar.”

Caramelinda swallows back her despair, but nods. Cal looks a mess, tattered clothes and a stricken look on his face. She doesn’t doubt that the grief she’s feeling is shared. “Don’t apologise, Lord Cruller. I’m just relieved you made it back in one piece.” She gestures to the servants with her head. “Go get yourself cleaned up and rested tonight, and I shall meet with you in the morning.”

But Calroy shakes his head and moves forward, gesturing towards her study. “All due respect, your majesty, but I’m fine. I’m sure we have a lot to talk about.”

He grabs a shawl and a towel from a nearby servant to make himself more presentable, and then starts walking, giving her a knowing look as he waits for her to fall in step beside him. Caramelinda sends him back one of gratitude, and she feels a weight lift off her shoulders at his steady stride for the first time since the message from Comida.

Calroy wastes no time in telling Caramelinda all he’s managed to find out along the Ceresian lines, while Caramelinda updates him on the state of the castle. With Sir Amanda gone to defend the Cola River, Caramelinda had been left mostly alone, with maps of war and tactics that she had hoped she’d never have to see again in her lifetime. The Candian council and elders are on the brink of panic, constantly pushing against her and demanding more, and without Amanda, Calroy, or even Amethar to keep them at bay, Caramelinda did not know how much longer she would have fared. By the time they’re finished, the sun has long since set, and lit candles flicker gently against the pink bricks.

Calroy, as deft with maps and strategy as he is with a sword, points to Castle Manylicks. “Sir Amanda can hold the Cola River, but Jawbreaker still stands at risk from the Ceresians. We should muster as many troops as we can and send them north.”

Caramelinda rubs her eyes, shaking her head. “The castle guard is already stretched too thin. Only the Knights of North Gumbia and the Tartguard remain.”

Cal smiles at her. “If I may, your majesty, Muffinfield remains far from the endangered borders. I would be happy to offer my troops to defend the castle in their stead.”

She raises her eyebrows at the suggestion. “Are you sure?”

“I insist.”

She lets out a sigh, sitting down heavily. “Thank you, Cal.”

Cal looks at her gently. “Forgive my forwardness, Caramelinda, but I believe the troops aren’t the only people stretched thin.”

Caramelinda wants to offer her usual words of reassurance, to tell Cal that she could bear it, but the words don’t come out. What does come out is this, weak and quiet: “He never told me.”

Calroy doesn’t say anything. The candles flicker.

“Twenty years, and I didn’t even know my own husband had been wed before. If he’d just _told_ me, there might’ve been a way—” She cuts herself off.

Calroy pauses before speaking, an undecipherable emotion in his eyes. “If it helps, he did not tell me either.”

This, Caramelinda is surprised about. “He never—not even you?”

He lets out a hollow chuckle. “Not even me.”

Caramelinda shakes her head in laughing disbelief. “You know, that does help, a bit. Feels less lonely.”

Calroy steps forward, puts a hand on her shoulder. “You’re not alone, Caramelinda. I promise you.”

She sighs, waves her hand in the air. “I just—I hate being another one of his… conquests. No offense.”

“None taken. You’re not, though. Even without the small chance that Catherine Ghee is still alive after all these years… You are still his wife, and Candia’s Queen, and have been the past twenty years. Anyone in the castle with any common sense knows who’s truly been keeping the kingdom together.”

Caramelinda still can’t look at him, but her hand reaches up to meet his on her shoulder in acknowledgment. The candle on her desk continues to burn, and she watches the shadows in the room turn slow as the flame moves minutely back and forth.

“What if they’re dead, Cal?” she says, so softly she’s surprised he hears her.

Calroy takes a moment to answer. “I don’t know,” he says, just as soft and raw in return, and Caramelinda finds herself grateful for his honesty. “I don’t know.”

“I can’t—I can’t lose anyone else,” she says, voice breaking.

Cal squeezes her shoulder, and Caramelinda finally looks at him, is met with the same mourning that eats at her mirrored in his eyes. “I know. I know. But we stand tall, and we keep moving. We don’t lose hope.”

Caramelinda knows that motto well. Knows it intimately, repeats it to herself every night since Lazuli died. She brings her sleeves up to wipe at the tears she didn’t know she’d been shedding. “For Candia.”

Cal nods. “For Candia.”

The war moves with haste, and so do the days, and Caramelinda sends their armies to protect Jawbreaker while Calroy musters his Muffinfield troops. She gets news of the onslaught at the Cola River, letters from Amanda with mostly good news, that she holds onto as a lifeline. Others, from her spies in Ceresia and Fructera, from Candians residing in Comida, that she dreads.

The Candian Council continues to pester her, lords and ladies pulling her in every direction—demanding she heed old alliances, pleading charity in defending their provinces, taking advantage of the war to win House Rocks’ favour. Caramelinda can hardly get a word in to explain between the constant rotation of people through the council room, but Calroy at least is there to lesson the pressure. Their nightly meetings are the only times Caramelinda has left to mourn in.

The latest group, relatives of Lord and Lady Swirlie who had come demanding amends after their lives had been lost on the trip to Comida, have Caramelinda at her near wits end. She clenches her fists under the table, forcing herself to take steady breaths even as she holds herself back from yelling that she had lost almost her entire family on that same trip, and Candia was in the midst of preparing for _war_.

The encounter ends with thinly veiled insults and festering anger, and Caramelinda slumps forward to hold her head in her hands when the door finally closes behind them. When she feels a hand on her shoulder, she jumps; Cal has always moved quietly, and Caramelinda had all but forgotten he was still in the room.

“Forgive me, your majesty, if this is not the time, but—you are doing good.” He says, giving her shoulder a squeeze. “Anyone else would be crumbling under the stress.”

Caramelinda gives him a dry smile. “I’m flattered you think that I am not.”

“I think,” he says, returning the smile, “that Candia would have fallen years ago without you, war or not.”

She lets out a huff. “Don’t give yourself too little credit.”

Calroy’s grin is sharp. “Trust me, Caramelinda, I am not.”

_Don’t lose hope,_ Calroy had said, and Caramelinda’s heart leaps into her throat when the nightwatch find her days later with the news that her daughters and King Amethar have returned. She is still in her nightgown when she rushes out into the cold night air, formality be damned, sweeping Jet and Ruby up into a crushing hug even as they whine. It is over a minute before she can bear to let them go, even as Calroy runs out behind her to all but tackle Amethar.

Jet and Ruby are weary, and Liam is burdened with heavy thoughts. Theo’s armour is dented and scratched, Amethar grieves. The Chancellor is—gone. War has made its presence known bright and clear.

But the children are still headstrong in spite. Theo is obsequious as ever, Cal is by Amethar’s side. Cumulous is a living reminder that Lazuli’s legacy lives on—and for a few hours, Caramelinda believes everything will be okay.

The night her family is finally reunited, Caramelinda runs into Theo, panicked and panting, sugar blood slick on his armour. She follows him on instinct, through a whirl of violence that she cannot begin to understand as Calroy’s soldiers attack them, as they run through the halls, as they slip into one of the many secret passages that the castle holds.

Theo explains to her what’s happened, words stumbling out of his mouth like panicked sugar flies. “…Either Calroy has been betrayed or he betrayed us.”

Despite everything, Caramelinda’s eyes narrow on instinct at Theo for the disrespect against his superior, when Calroy had spent nights mourning with her for him and the rest of her family. Her mind races—if Calroy’s forces have betrayed him, a good portion of the castle remains unsafe, but the Muffinfield soldiers have been serving here for hardly a week, and he knows the castle as well as they do. He can’t be—

“Caramelinda~!” There is a singsong voice shouting from beyond the passage wall, a voice unfathomably familiar and foreign all at once that freezes her blood like ice. She has never heard that particular voice sound like that in her whole life.

“I’m afraid your dear husband, or, I suppose, seeing that your marriage never truly transpired, the man who made bastards of your daughters, has had an unfortunate fall.”

No, Caramelinda thinks. No.

Theo looks at her, worry in his eyes, and she stammers, speechless, unable to do anything but stare back, eyes blown in horror and disbelief. A million memories run through her head at once—Ruby, taking her first steps into a laughing Cal’s arms; Jet, grinning and out of breath as she wins a duel with him for the first time; him and Amethar, joined at the hips at every political feast.

He can’t—

“Where are you~?”

Candlelight gossip and Fructeran wine and evenings spent pouring over letters.

He—

“We shouldn't take the bait, we should go down,” Theo says, voice cutting through her panic, steadfast as always. An anchor to the present.

Something in Caramelinda shatters. She sets her shoulders back and forces her thoughts to come one by one. Muffinfield has betrayed them. The castle is unsafe. Jet and Ruby are missing. Amethar is… She draws in a shaky breath.

Theo touches her arm, looks at her sharply. “There's a good chance he's bluffing. We know, of all the good qualities of King Amethar, perhaps his greatest is that he's very difficult to kill.”

Caramelinda looks down at the dark spiral staircase. Looks back at the passage wall, hears that familiar gait just outside of it. Wants desperately to ignore Theo, to wake up from whatever nightmare she’s found herself in, to go back out there to her family.

She closes her eyes.

(There is a weight that sits on her shoulders, lonely and burning, that she does not think will ever leave her.)

Without another word, Queen Caramelinda Rocks descends down the stairs to escape her own castle, pausing only to blow out the dwindling candlelight behind her.

**Author's Note:**

> *takes dramatic irony and double meaning in my hands and dances with it so sweetly*
> 
> the detail about lazuli sending cal letters is taken from [this fic](https://archiveofourown.org/works/24854806) which you should all read because lydia’s writing is phenomenal and prince consort cal au is consuming my brain at all times. cal talks in his monologue about knowing the sisters, so i like to think they were all on good terms (besides, the, uh, you know)
> 
> thanks for reading! come yell at me about calroy and caramelinda on my [twitter](https://twitter.com/kindlestuck) or my [tumblr](https://kindlespark.tumblr.com)!


End file.
